human rights

The United Nation Human Rights Council (HRC) kicked off its Universal Periodic Review, or UPR, on Monday at the Palais des Nations in Geneva to examine the human rights situation in 14 countries, including Afghanistan and Yemen.

Calling on governments to take human rights obligations into account when designing economic reforms, an independent United Nations rights expert said on Monday that “human rights impact assessments are key to the process”.

Reports that Sudanese security agents have used live ammunition and tear gas against anti-Government protesters gathering at hospitals in the capital Khartoum are “deeply worrying”, the UN’s top human rights official, Michelle Bachelet, said on Thursday. Daniel Johnson from UN News spoke to Ravina Shamdasani from OHCHR .

A group of six independent United Nations rights experts called on Iran Wednesday to urgently provide Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Narges Mohammadi access to appropriate health care, and reiterated calls for their immediate release, as they continue a hunger strike in protest.

They have a saying where Rebeca Gyumi comes from in Tanzania, which sums up the collective spirit of community she grew up in: “I am, because you are”. The drive to champion human rights instilled in her as a girl, came to fruition last December, when she arrived at UN Headquarters in New York, as a recipient of the prestigious UN Human Rights Prize.

At UN News, 2018 kicked off with UNICEF’s “challenge” to all nations to make sure more newborns survive their first days of life by ensuring they are protected from treatable diseases as well as having access to proven, low-cost health solutions in their first months.